Through the Streets of Rome
by I am that Writer
Summary: [Jason's point of view.] A Jasper FanFiction. Reyna gave Jason permission to show Piper New Rome, so Jason does just that with the brief time they have together before Leo starts firing the ballistae on the forum. They might even stop for cups of coffee along the way and experience a whipped cream kiss. One shot.


**_– Through the Streets of Rome –_**

* * *

**Jason was holding Piper's hand.** She walked cheerfully beside him, smiling, the sun's rays casting off of her face, making it glow. They walked down a street in New Rome. Jason was happy Reyna had granted him permission to show Piper his home; Piper seemed to be enjoying it, too.

"Ooh, look, Jason!" Piper cried eagerly. She smiled and pointed to a nearby coffee shop. Jason turned to look at her, marveling at how beautiful she was, even in the everyday jeans and sweet _Hello Kitty_ tank top she wore today. Her feet were clad in sneakers, and an eagle's feather was braided into her long, chocolate-brown hair. Her multi-colored eyes sparkled as she smiled.

"Should we each get a cup?" Jason offered.

Piper turned to look at him and bobbed her head, still smiling.

They walked to the coffee shop, taking their time, admiring all of New Rome's beauty. Even Jason found the old streets, through which he'd walked numerous times before, fascinating, being back after all this time. Maybe it was even more amazing now because he had Piper at his side.

Inside the coffee shop, Jason was disappointed that the young boy behind the register was new, a face he'd never seen before. He'd sort of been excited, hoping to see a familiar old friend, be able to chat with them and catch up on a few things and introduce Piper to them. But Jason put on a smile, anyway, for the boy, and ordered two cups of coffee—no whipped cream for Piper, thank you very much. ("I don't really like it, and it's just fattening, anyway," she'd shrugged.) As the boy went to the back of the shop to get their drinks, Jason looked around, trying to recall sometime he'd been in here. The shop was empty, not surprising, since most people were out of their houses and in the forum in the excitement of Jason and the others arriving on the _Argo II_.

Piper suddenly reached over and took his hand, entwining her slender fingers with his, which somehow seemed to fit perfectly together, like a jigsaw puzzle. Jason looked at her and smiled. "No whipped cream?" he asked playfully, raising an eyebrow. "Since when are you on a diet?"

"Since I'm your amazingly fit girlfriend," Piper answered, slapping his arm.

"You don't have to skimp on _whipped cream_ to stay fit," Jason said, trying not to look at Piper's slender body that he sometimes sneaked glances of. "You always work out all the time, anyway."

"It's not just about the unbelievable amount of calories in whipped cream: I told you, I don't _like_ it," Piper replied.

Jason gave her a look.

She sighed. "Okay, so maybe Lacy's fitness schedules have been rubbing off on me a little, too."

Just then, the boy came back with their drinks. Jason thanked him, took his drink and gave Piper hers, and fished around in his jeans pocket before bringing out a couple of denarri. When the boy shook his head, embarrassed, that it wasn't enough, Jason looked at Piper helplessly, who rolled her eyes and brought out the rest of the money from her pocket to pay.

They took their drinks outside and sat on a bench in front of a fountain; the water splashing behind them was noisy, but somehow comforting. Jason looked around. It was so _strange_ that there were hardly any people in the streets; he thought he spotted a couple of people at the end of one long street to his right. He and Piper were also out of sight from the coffee shop thus the waiter's view inside of it, so as far as Jason knew, he and Piper were all alone.

He looked over at her and saw her looking frustrated, trying to put the plastic lid back on her cup, which had somehow popped off. Jason watched, smirking, not bothering to hide his amusement, as she struggled. Eventually Piper caught him staring and gave a huff before finally popping the lid back on. Raising both eyebrows, she turned toward Jason and gave a loud slurp of her drink.

Jason turned to his own drink and scooped up some whipped cream with the end of his straw. Slipping his straw out of his lid, he held out the clump of whipped cream to Piper, one open palm underneath to catch the drips. "Here," he said.

Piper took one look at his offer and shook her head. "I don't like it," she repeated herself from earlier.

"Take it. I didn't drink out of my straw yet and I promise you the whipped cream in New Rome is the best you'll ever taste," Jason insisted.

Piper sighed and gave him a withering glare that just looked too cute for Jason to take seriously. "You don't want me sucking all over that," she pointed out.

Jason shrugged. "I really don't mind. Argentum and Aurum licked from my lunch and dinner plates when I ate in the _Principia_ all the time."

"Really? From what you've told me, they seem too well-trained to do that," Piper said, grinning.

"Oh, yeah. I fed them jelly beans out of my hand every morning before I started work; and I'm pretty sure your saliva would taste a whole lot better than theirs." He gave a disgusted look at remembering the dog flavor he could never seem to get out of the meals he ate in the _Principia_.

"Jelly beans?" Piper's smile faltered. She looked down at the cup of coffee she was holding in her lap and whispered, "Those are Reyna's favorite candy."

"She probably picked it up from the dogs," Jason replied quickly—probably _too_ quickly, his voice light. "Seriously, they ate so many I had to buy pounds of them in plastic bags every night before I went to bed for them the next morning."

Piper laughed.

Jason grinned and continued. "And I was always picked on by Octavian for poorly managing the Coherts' and New Rome's taxes—but most of the money was probably spent on those dumb dogs. I probably could have gone broke just by feeding them." Jason shook his head, smiling because Piper was smiling again.

His thoughts started to wander about Argentum and Aurum, and back to when he was a praetor in the _Principia_. He'd called them dumb, but the pair of dogs were actually very smart, and sort of his friends, in their own way.

So he practically jumped out of his skin in surprise when Piper leaped forward and bent her head down to lick the now-melting glob of whipped cream off of his straw. He watched, in suspense, as she slowly swallowed, looking upward into the sky, deciding upon its flavor. When she finally turned back to him, smiling, Jason practically sighed in relief.

"It's delicious, by far the best whipped cream I've ever tasted. It's got to be homemade," Piper decided.

Jason grinned and was about to cross his arms in smugness at being right when Piper leaned forward and planted a kiss on his cheek. Her lips were coated in cold whipped cream—and Jason was sure his cheek was left with a white, sugary mark on it—but Jason could still feel the warmth of her soft skin underneath, and with his nose close by her hair, smell her lotus shampoo.

Piper pulled back, grinning. She always smiled after she kissed him, sort of goofily, and had a dreamy look in her eyes. Jason probably looked worse. He noticed she had a cute whipped cream moustache above her upper lip and wanted to kiss it away—the whipped cream would taste _doubly_ delicious that way, for sure.

"_But_—" Piper held up a finger. "—whipped cream still isn't a favorite of mine, and it's not worth getting on my coffee for the calories it contains."

Jason took his straw back and dipped it in his cup to scoop out more whipped cream, then began blotting it all over and around his mouth, like an Aphrodite girl doing her lipstick.

"What are you doing?" Piper asked, laughing, but sounding a little nervous at her boyfriend's strange behavior.

"Showing you that you _love_ whipped cream, that it's a favorite of yours, and that it's _definitely_ worth the calories," Jason answered. He figured he had to look stupid talking with white cream all over his mouth, so he hurriedly completed his plan, leaning forward and kissing Piper full on the mouth.

It was a longer kiss of theirs, and new and strange with the whipped cream idea of Jason's, but somehow lovely in its own way. When Jason pulled back, they were both panting slightly.

"So, was it worth it now, Beauty Queen?" Jason asked, grinning, using Leo's favorite nickname for Piper.

"Yes—but that's cheating!" Piper laughed, looking a little embarrassed. She tossed her long braid over her shoulder, which had fallen in front sometime during their kiss. "I also heard kissing burns calories—so, yeah, I guess it was probably worth it," Piper answered, still smiling, drawing calming little circles with her finger on her leg. Jason thought he heard her mutter, "I'll _never_ be able to think of whipped cream normally again. . . ."

"Where did you hear that—about kissing burning calories?" Jason asked, raising a teasing eyebrow.

Piper waved a hand. "Trust me, you hear a _lot_—and all about . . . _that_ stuff—when you live in the Aphrodite Cabin."

This was why Jason loved being around Piper so much—she made him feel normal, like an everyday guy with his girlfriend, not some demigod trying to find time to scrounge up a date with his partner in fighting monsters. But somehow, he never forgot that demigod part of them, either, and it connected them even more.

He realized he'd been staring into Piper's eyes for a long time, and she was starting to look suspicious, so he quickly looked away and muttered, "Um, yeah, sure."

They'd hardly drank any of their coffee, but Jason stood and offered a hand to Piper, who took it and stood up beside him.

"Come on, I'll show you the rest of New Rome," Jason offered, wiping the remains of whipped cream from his mouth and gesturing that Piper should do the same.

• • •

Jason was just showing Piper one street of houses for families staying in New Rome, and about to reach the _Principia_, when he heard the commotion. Shouting and huge blasting sounds in the air.

"What the heck?" Piper murmured beside him, both of them turning toward the sound.

"We should probably go check it out," Jason said, narrowing his eyes, his role as a son of Jupiter stepping in.

Piper looked regretful about her tour not getting finished, but she knew how Jason was and felt about these kind of things, so she followed him dutifully.

When they reached the forum . . . it was chaos. More explosions sounded nearby, and Piper gasped as she must have realized at the same time Jason did that they were coming from the _Argo II_. Jason remembered Leo had shown Octavian on board after the feast, but Octavian firing on his own home didn't make any sense. . . .

Jason swallowed hard. That only left one person.

Leo.

Leo was the only one who could be firing the ballistae, probably the only person who knew _how_ to fire them. But why was he firing on Camp Jupiter? Maybe Octavian had put him up to it, for some strange reason, or . . .

Jason swallowed hard. Whatever the reason, it better be a good one when he next spoke with Leo. The whole thing seemed to be screaming "crazy" and "suspicious."

Jason looked around and realized the forum was worse off than he'd thought. There was yelling and fistfights (no weapons allowed in New Rome, on Terminus's strict order, thank the gods), and Jason thought he saw a burning sofa fly through the air.

"Leo?" Piper asked, looking at Jason, her face white, her lips barely moving.

Jason nodded tightly.

"What do we do?" Piper asked fearfully.

"We have to stop all of this," Jason decided, and strode forward.

Piper followed him as he strode to a small clearing, a bit higher off the ground, so people could see him. When people recognized him, they turned to him and immediately screamed, "Traitor! You are a disgrace to the Romans!"

"Yeah, which side are you on, anyway?" someone else shouted.

Jason felt his face blanch and his hands start shaking. This was _not_ the way he'd hoped things would go.

It went from bad to worse when the crowd started to pelt food and dishes and rocks at him and Piper.

"Romans! Please stop and listen! I'm on your side!" Jason pleaded. He looked over at Piper. "We're both with you! We're not traitors! None of us! Please!"

His pleading didn't help, though, and almost seemed to make the crowd crow angrier. One Roman girl whom Jason didn't recognize surged forward and threw a rock, which hit him on the side of his head. Jason felt warm blood beginning to seep through his hair, from where it trickled down his cheek.

Piper gasped, her hands fluttering to her mouth, and immediately turned to the Romans in front of them and tried to charmspeak them to calm down and back away. It worked for a few of those closest to them, but most just kept advancing, and as Piper got more scared and nervous, her voice lost its magical touch.

"Romans! Please!" Jason kept repeating. He felt that the orange Camp Half-Blood T-shirt he was wearing wasn't helping matters, and wished that he could somehow hide it, cover it up, maybe wrap his purple Roman cloak around it . . .

"Traitors!" the crowd screamed, though some shouted the word singular. They seemed a lot more mad at Jason than Piper, which Jason was actually thankful for. He was worried that the crowd might try to hurt Piper.

"You come home to us and lie, saying that you're our friend, but you've brought these enemies with you to destroy our city!"

Jason felt sick as he recognized this shouting boy's face as Bobby, one of his old friends.

Jason saw more people bending down to pick up rocks and bricks, and he jumped in front of Piper, trying to shield her, but her back was still unprotected. Piper started up the lame attempt of trying to charmspeak the crowd again.

"Please!" Jason shouted. "This is all a misunderstanding! Where is Reyna? We can talk this over!"

He didn't think he could be heard by even Piper above all the din.

Jason didn't see the brick, but some dark-red object sailed toward him, in the corner of his vision, and he turned to look at it.

Then something clunked him on the head, and he barely heard Piper's screams before everything turned black and his body slumped to the ground, unconscious.

* * *

**Hmm, I'm not sure if that left off very well, but it's not a cliffhanger or anything, because you guys know what happens next, right?**

**What's your favorite Jasper moment from the books?**


End file.
